by Admin | Jul 8, 2014 | News
(BGF) – Will Europe have a strong enough voice in resolving disputes in the East Asia, or just leave it to the U.S? The Harvard professor Joseph Nye, member of the Boston Global Forum’s Board of Thinkers, shared his view in the course of BGF’s one month length conferences aiming at building a framework for peace and security to the Pacific.
The U.S., Europe, and China
By Joseph S. Nye, Jr.
How is Europe responding to the rise of China? As one columnist put it, there is nothing much European governments can do in East Asia save serve as marketing managers for their domestic businesses. They have neither the diplomatic weight nor the military heft to make an impression in the region. Better leave the heavy lifting to the Americans.
If this is true, what will it mean for U.S.-European relations –particularly now that the Obama Administration has announced a “pivot”toward Asia? Since 1941, the United States has privileged its relations with Europe; but now Europe will recede in priority as it sits on the sidelines and follows a solely commercial logic in its relations with Asia. Moreover as Europe sells high tech dual use products that complicate the American security role in Asia, friction is bound to arise between the United States and Europe. Pessimists portray an erosion of the Atlantic partnership that has been crucial to geo-political stability for nearly three quarters of a century.
Fortunately, this picture is unduly dire. For one thing, the Obama Administration has rejected the word “pivot”(which implies turning away) in favor of “rebalancing”toward Asia. That policy reflects the increased economic role of Asia in the world economy without rejecting the importance of the European Union which remains the largest economic entity in the world, as well as a fruitful source of economic innovation as well as cultural ideas and values including human rights.
The recovery of Asia represents one of the great power shifts of this century. Before the industrial revolution, Asia represented more than half the world’s people and more than half the world’s economy. The latter shrank to 20 percent by 1900, but with rapid industrialization, Asia should return to “normal”proportions of half the world’s population and economy by the latter part of this century. This is good news because it represents the rise of hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. But there could also be bad news.
Historians often warn that the rapid rise of new powers like China can create fear and uncertainty that could trigger serious conflict such as Europe experienced a century ago when Germany passed Britain in industrial production. Moreover, unlike Europe where a profound reconciliation occurred within the European Union after World War II, Asia is still riven by territorial claims and disputes over history. Maintaining a stable security balance is not easy in such circumstances.
When the Clinton Administration considered how to respond to the rise of China in the 1990s, some critics urged a policy of containment before China became too strong. Clinton rejected such advice for two reasons. First, it would have been impossible to forge an anti-China alliance since most countries in the region wanted (and still want) good relations with both the U.S. and China. Even more important, such a policy would have unnecessarily guaranteed future enmity with China. Instead Clinton chose a policy that could be called “integrate and insure”. China was welcomed into the World Trade Organization, but the U.S.-Japan security treaty was revived to insure against China becoming a bully. If a rising China throws its weight around, it drives neighbors to seek to balance its power. In that sense, only China can contain China. (And some would say that its recent actions on the Indian border and in adjoining seas are doing just that.) An American naval presence helps to shape the security environment to encourage responsible behavior. While any country’s wish list may be infinite, most tailor their appetites when prices are on the menu.
Where does Europe fit in this picture? First, as indicated above, it should monitor and restrain sensitive exports to avoid making the security situation more dangerous for its NATO ally. Even in trading terms, Europe has an interest in regional stability and secure sea lines of communication. But equally important, Europe can contribute significantly to the development of the norms that also help shape the environment. For example, China follows an idiosyncratic interpretation of the UN Law of the Sea Treaty. Europe, even more than the U.S. (which has still failed to ratify the treaty) is better placed to reinforce the norm. Europe is an important source of the acceptance and multilateral legitimacy which China seeks.
Some analysts see China as a revisionist state eager to overthrow the established international order as its strength increases. But China is not Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. China has benefited greatly from and is not eager to destroy existing international institutions such as the UN, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade Organization –as well as others where European governments play a major role. Here again Europe can help shape the environment to encourage responsible behavior.
In addition, technological and social changes are adding a number of important transnational issues to the global agenda such as climate change, pandemics, terrorism, organized crime, and cyber crime. These issues represent not a transition of power among states, but a diffusion of power away from governments. Coping with these global threats will require increased inter-governmental cooperation that includes China, Europe and the United States.
Finally, there is the question of values. No-one knows how China will evolve as it becomes a middle class nation. We do know that political change tends to occur when countries reach per capita incomes around $10,000. Thus far, Europe and the US have stood together in resisting Chinese (and Russian) demands for greater control of free speech on the internet. And European countries like Norway and Germany have been willing to pay some price for standing up to China on human rights issues. Whether an increased Chinese economic interest in an impartial rule of law (as opposed to rule by law) will lead to greater protection of individual rights remains to be seen. Only China will decide, but again Europe can play a role.
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Joseph S. Nye, Jr. is a professor at Harvard and author of The Future of Power; member of the Boston Global Forum’s Board of Thinkers.
by Admin | Jul 10, 2014 | News
(BGF) – The U.S. Ambassador James D. Bindenagel believed that the resurgence of nationalism past which lurks behind modern leaders’ mind is the truly root of the world’s current conflicts and imposes dangerous challenge to the liberal international order that exists today. It also explains the China’s acts in the East and South China Sea. He also summed up results of the Boston Global Forum Initiative’s online conference which was on July 2 aiming at building a framework for peace and security in the Pacific, and suggested the Scenario model to deal with conflicts.
South China Seas and the Paracel Islands
Quan Dao Hoang Sa — Hsi-sha Ch’ün-tao
Risks of Unresolved Territorial Conflict: The Challenge to Turn Enmity into Amity
By James D. Bindenagel
Photo: From Left to Right, Governor Michael Dukakis, Australia’s PM Kevin Rudd, BGF’s Editor-in-Chief Nguyen Anh Tuan, and Ambassador James D. Bindenagel.
Burgeoning conflicts in the Western Pacific have captured world attention. Ever-more combative conflicts over competing claims between Japan and China over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea have led to confrontation—challenges in the air and on sea between rival naval military forces.
There is an ominous trend, that China and Japan seem so determined to go toe-to-toe with each other. Japan’s Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, recently likened the tensions between Japan and China to the relationship between Germany as a rising power challenging the United Kingdom 100 years ago, when the arms race over the Dreadnaughts helped lead to the First World War. People throughout Asia must nervously reflect on the hard lessons the Europeans learned from 1914-1991. Europeans are revisiting the Great War on the 100th anniversary of its outbreak in August 1914, after Gavrilo Princip, a local terrorist in Serbia– not one of the major treaty powers that became belligerents– assassinated the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and unleashed a devastating global war that wiped out a generation. The failure of European leadership a century ago brought calamity to Europe.
Lurking behind modern leaders are the ghosts of nationalisms past. Resurgent nationalism, which had such terrible consequences in Europe as recently as the breakup of Yugoslavia, is a dangerous challenge to the liberal international order that exists today. Even now, the Europeans are again seeing the rise of ethnic nationalism linked with the use of force by Russia in Ukraine. Russian action in Ukraine recalls the tragic and bloody disintegration of Yugoslavia. World leaders will also look to China/Japan as those countries work to manage their interwoven history: China suffered humiliation at the hands of Imperial Japan, and Japanese apologies have been inadequate to gain acceptance from neighboring countries and move beyond historical grievances. Nationalism is now a quick but highly risky device for leaders to try to drum up domestic support. And abroad, nationalism increases fear and animosity in reaction.
In China, failure by Japan to acknowledge the historic wrongs during the conquest of Nanjing, and the controversial visit by Prime Minister Abe to the shrine at Yasukuni remain significant symbols of a deficit of justice for China. Japan and China seem caught in a vortex of each country’s cultural vortices, where in Japan apology is associated with shame, and in China, the wounds of the Second World War sow seeds of new nationalism.
Nationalism has had a resurgence recently in Europe as well. Russian President Vladimir Putin is aggrieved with the outcome of history and the demise of the Soviet Union – in his mind, the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century”. He now seeks to reverse the effects of history by making an effort to shape current events to recover what he thinks Premier Gorbachev lost in territory and influence. He may be completely misguided, but it is important to understand what motivates him. After all, the sense of affliction and the appeal of ethnic nationalism are not just in his mind, but in the minds of many Russians.
It is apparent that President Xi is promoting a return to the Chinese Nationalist past, for example, by giving recognition of to the contributions to culture and history by Confucius. There is increased interest in traditional Chinese culture, a part of a political effort to stabilize the country in the aftermath of great economic growth and change. Promoting nationalism at the cost of rule of law and collaboration with neighbors takes the country in the wrong direction. President Xi has set out to achieve “a Chinese dream” of a “great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.” The first three priorities, according to him, are: restoring Taiwan to China, regaining the Diaoyu or Senkaku islands from Japan; and “taking back sovereignty of the South China Sea,” a maritime territory that is disputed by more than 10 countries. China is pressing its claims backed by force and undermining its peaceful rise to global power status.
The South China Seas confrontation is dangerous. Recent unilateral placement of a deep-sea oil rig by the Chinese National Overseas Oil Company (CNOOC), to assert Chinese claims to the disputed Paracel Islands, has alarmed the United States, Vietnam and others in East Asia. Although there has been a public groundswell of anti-China sentiment, and Vietnam has a compelling desire to defend its maritime territory, the smaller country has few good options. So, it has to choose a course carefully. Hanoi knows it needs stable relations with China, and it looks to the United States (ironically given 1968-1975 war with the U.S.) to support stability in the region. China’s neighbors may be forced to seek outside assistance and military cooperation to counterbalance a more aggressive China.
Defusing Conflict in the South and East China Seas
China is moving forward with unilateral energy exploration in the South China Sea and is using the placement of a deep-sea oil rig to assert its claims to the disputed Paracel Islands. The move has concerned Vietnam and other regional powers, which also claim territorial rights over the waters and islands in that area. The United States is concerned over regional stability, international global commercial sea lanes, and legal status. Beijing’s decision will likely prompt Vietnam to deploy its coast guard or naval vessels to assert its own claim to the area and accelerate its efforts to draw in foreign partners for oil exploration and production. But Beijing is calculating that Vietnam will be unwilling and unable to make any serious attempt to stop the Chinese drilling.
According to Stratfor analysts, Beijing continues to rely on its growing military and technological capabilities to test its asserted nine-dash line expansionary claims over maritime boundaries in the East and South China Seas. Along with responses and reactions from neighboring countries and outside parties, China’s reliance on the military, a potentially destabilizing factor, will continue to shape the region’s security environment, even though Beijing is maneuvering carefully to avoid outright conflict while exerting its authority.
China took control of the Paracel Island chain by force in the 1970s, but it did not begin to formally enforce its claim until the late 2000s, when it undertook a broader, more aggressive maritime expansion plan. Beijing stepped up its military presence in and around the islands and established the Sansha administrative region, which encompasses the Paracel Islands, Spratly Islands and the Macclesfield Bank, and falls under the jurisdiction of Hainan province, as a symbol of China’s de facto control.
The case of the Paracels is just one example of how Beijing is firming up its presence in the South China Sea and gradually eroding other claimants’ ability to challenge its supremacy. But even as Beijing ambitiously claims the entire South China Sea, bounded by the so-called nine-dash line, it has no real presence on any island (besides a few atolls and reefs) in the distant Spratly Island chain. In addition to China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei and Taiwan have claims in the island chain. China’s navy is not good enough to overcome the logistical challenges such distances present, so its ability to project its dominance throughout the maritime sphere is limited.
Instead, Beijing’s strategy seems to consist of three steps. First, it uses the nine-dash line as a historical justification for its intrusions into disputed waters. Second, it enforces its claim in tactically advantageous areas where it has an actual presence, such as the Paracels and the Scarborough Shoal, which it seized from the Philippines in 2012. Third, it continues to develop its military and technological capabilities to carefully push its maritime boundaries farther without antagonizing all of its neighbors at once. (Stratfor, May 8, 2014 “China Uses Deep-Sea Oil Exploration to Push Its Maritime Claims”)
The escalation of Chinese engagement in the Paracel Islands and off the coasts of Vietnam and the Philippines calls for options to defuse the conflict and avoid armed conflict.
Despite growing nationalisms, within and in reaction to China’s rise, which threaten peace, efforts should be made to work cooperatively with China — not to contain it. Japan, China, and others (Vietnam, Philippines) should set aside the unresolved issues and turn to joint management of national interests in fishing, energy and resource development. Codes of conduct in the East and South China Sea are necessary to manage maritime operations. Joint maritime policing, adherence to the Law of the Sea and maintenance of the freedom of the seas for shipping, could also help to avoid political miscalculation and military confrontation. Most important, the Chinese, Japanese and regional leaders should set aside the use of force to resolve tension, such as those over the Paracels, Senkaku/Diaoyu, and other Islands.
The Boston Global Forum should convene and craft a framework for dispute resolution, including a conference on the issues and a dialog that could address engagement among the parties.
What practical engagement steps could break the stalemate and avoid conflict?
There are three dimensions that generally surround conflict. Adam Kahane outlines them in his book “Solving Tough Problems:” dynamically, generatively, and socially complex. The current challenges in Southeast Asia involve problems that are dynamically complex stemming from history where cause and effect are far apart in space and time. Other elements of the conflict are generatively complex as tension unfolds in unfamiliar and unpredictable ways. And difficulties are socially complex because people see the problems differently and the problem has become polarized and stuck.
Professor Ezra Vogel’s frames five questions in the South China Seas challenge. First, prevent explosive conflicts; 2) deal with practical issues of environment, maritime management, resource development; 3) develop Asian “ownership” of the issue through International Court of Justice; 4) create new structures; 5) defuse emotional issues of history, especially WWII reconciliation.
As the State Department has noted, States have the first level of responsibility to prevent explosive conflicts. And there is high level involvement in regional meetings as well as efforts for institutions to take on practical mechanisms for cooperation, especially in maritime capacity building and trust/confidence building measures. Solutions and components of the Boston Global Forum Framework for governments to address include developing deeper cooperation and collaboration by:
– Agreeing on rule of law for resolution of disputes is a primary commitment not to use force to resolve disputes. Adhering to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and implementing international law and conventions about territories and skies as well as the Code of Conduct and an international convention/ law on cyber and data security.
– Building international structures for consultation, negotiation and cooperation that have enough power and rights to judge and re-enforce countries respect laws and conventions. States can build and are building on the East Asian Summit, ASEAN, ASEAN Regional Forums, and ASEAN +3 (China, Japan, South Korea) with observers from U.S., India, Australia and New Zealand. China, Japan and South Korea could create a Trilateral Group to address regional issues in East and North East Asia.
There are many issues to be addressed including, enhancing transparency in government policies, granting information rights/data protection of people in all countries, and managing jointly large marine ecosystems.
– Integrating Asian economies into the global economy through the WTO, International Financial Institutions (IFIs), and regional economies as well as agreeing on the Transpacific Partnership (TPP) and rules of global governance. Cooperation among states can also improve rights, safety, and life conditions of workers and promote Corporate Social Responsibility.
– Assuring regional security calls for the United States presence not to undermine China’s peaceful rise. Building a multilateral framework for security discussions such as the Munich Security Conference or the German Marshall Fund Brussels Forum offer models. The U.S. remains a Pacific power and will be engaged with all the parties in the region to play its role in maintaining peace and security. The Financial Times (May 2, 2014) reported that the “US president’s approach is clear enough. Washington’s response to China’s rise has been to engage and hedge – to seek to draw Beijing into the international system while refurbishing its own regional alliances. More recently, Chinese assertiveness in the East and South China Seas has led US policy to tilt towards a sturdier “engage and compete”.
– Assisting in reconciliation, especially for historical grievances, is a pre-condition for regional security Unresolved conflicts are the seeds of nationalism and new confrontation such as those on-going over the Senkakus, Paracel, Spratley Islands and the Scarborough Reef. US and European efforts on World War II reconciliation projects have contributed to the regional peace in Europe for 70 years. The BGF Framework should include regional structures where bi-lateral disputes can be discussed. Exchange programs for culture, music and art between countries face-to-face and through the Internet . In addition to young leaders, the countries’ leaders should prepare a white paper on each one’s understanding of their historic relations and contributions to peaceful relations since 1974. The Gulf of Tonkin-Hainan agreement between China and Vietnam is one example of a common approach can grow form shared historical narratives that can lead to better understanding,
The Boston Global Forum could have several roles. First, as in planned in Vietnam, BGF is providing a platform for international discussion of these issues and can influence the governments involved. Second, as Ambassador Shinji Yanai noted BGF could meet on a Track II or Track 1.5 basis face-to-face and address some of these issues as Tom Patterson outlined – China and the new Asia-Pacific security structure; what support the U.S. could give to smaller countries without upsetting China; and what role should smaller countries play. Third, I would suggest national/multinational scenario projects to create visions of the outcomes of the political developments with the aim not of predicting the future but to influence the outcome, to create possibilities and avoid resignation into powerlessness.
Scenarios to Shape the Future
The scenario model I suggest is based on Adam Kahane’s work with several countries, notably the South Africans in their peaceful transition avoiding the racial war so many predicted. Elements of such a long-term project include:
– Inviting leaders (mid-level) from business, academia and government to create scenarios.
– Call for Scenarios address a threatening problem
– Key perspectives are represented
– National leaders endorse the project
– Workshops for scenarios/stories of what the group wants in the future
– Discussion among participants on what is plausible, not that the scenario can’t happen
– Retreat atmosphere with free time for sharing thought
– Sub-teams created for expanded discussion over 3 months
– Presentations to political leadership with competing scenarios
– National conversations
A similar process hosted by the Aspen Institute Berlin in the 1980’s brought together mid-level participants involved in key decisions shaping the post-Berlin Wall world and they rose to policy making positions.
Justification
Efforts should be made to work cooperatively with China — not to contain it, while taking care not to engage in nationalistic antagonisms. Japan, China, and others (Vietnam, Philippines) should set aside their unresolved issues and turn to joint management of national interests in fishing, energy and resource development. Codes of conduct in the East and South China Sea are necessary to manage maritime operations. Joint maritime policing, adherence to the Law of the Sea and maintenance of the freedom of the seas for shipping, could also help to forestall political miscalculation and military confrontation. Most important, the Chinese, Japanese and regional leaders should take the use of force off the table to resolve tension, such as those over the Paracels, Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, Scarborough Reef and other disputes.
Japan has a special role to address post WWII reconciliation and “could and should have done much more to give real substance to its apologies, as the Germans have done. At least since 1970, Germany has taken a comprehensive and credible approach to atoning for its Nazi past, fully acknowledging its horrors in school curricula, graphically commemorating them in museums, monuments, and ceremonies, and employing official discourse that has been unfailingly contrite.” (Lionel Barber, FT)
There is no denying that China suffered humiliation from the Japanese Imperial Army invasion in the Sino-Japanese Wars, and China is particular bitter about the rape of Nanjing. Little wonder, given the absence of acceptance of the apology from Japan, that the Second World War continues to feed Chinese anger. The longer term challenge, in Europe, involving Russian ethnic nationalism or in Asia with Chinese nationalism, is how to turn enmity into amity. Then as now, the best way to proceed is to begin with small steps in the resolution of many disputes. And this is where Japan’s Prime Minister must do much more than (implicitly) point the finger at China.
The parties should engage with each other in clarifying narrative to promote mutual understanding and prevent angry populisms and xenophobic nationalism that can rebound to destroy leaders and countries. The United States should provide needed leadership among parties to create and share historical narratives that can lead to better understanding.
One way to better understanding can come from scenario building or storytelling, which are powerful tools. Scenarios should be built for Japan, Vietnam and China identifying young leaders from politics, business and academia to come together frequently to present their narratives and share comprehensive discussions on a broad range of issues to strengthen mutual understanding and cooperation.
by Admin | Jul 8, 2014 | Highlights
(BGF) – Rana plaza collapse in April 2013 waved a wake up call for improving the working conditions in Bangladesh. to the issue in the year of 2013. Mr. Arnold Zack provided BGF his views on dealing with the issue, to which the Boston Global Forum has organized several conferences to seek for solutions.
In an Era of Accelerating Attention to Workplace Equity: What Place for Bangladesh?
Reflections on the Bangladesh Development Conference 2014 at Harvard University
By Arnold M. Zack, Senior Research Associate, Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School
When Mohammed I. Yousuf asked me to participate in the June 14, 2014 conference on Globalization and Sustainability of the Bangladesh Garment Industry, I doubted whether my experience in mediation and in designing labor dispute resolution systems would have much applicability in that country and that industry. But a review of the history of worker and public concern for worker conditions in developing countries shows a trail that leads us to what’s now happening in Bangladesh.
In the 1970s and 1980s when European and American Brands began sending abroad for assembly of garments, there was a protest over the loss of the jobs at home where our workers had previously made those clothes. Then, when it became apparent that those garments were being made in countries where wage rates were but a fraction of what textile and garment workers were paid in North America and Europe a new round of protests against the brands arose over the unfair conditions under which those garments were made. When the universal practice of contracting out that work to factories owned, not by the brands but by others who in turn subcontracted their work to even smaller factories, the public outcry shifted from the brands to the countries that enabled factories to engage in such unfair practices. Brands were uniform in proclaiming their endorsement of fair labor standards in widely publicized Codes of Conduct, while shifting the onus onto the presumably unscrupulous factory owners(with whom the contracted for garments), and by asserting they did their best to routinely monitor the situation to uncover and prevent worker exploitation.
During that period, I accepted the bona fides of the brand assertions although I should have realized that self monitoring such as was done by GAP, Disney and other mega manufacturers, could uncover or prevent little when their few monitors had responsibility for monitoring more than 5,000, 10,000 or in the case of Disney 15,000 factories making their logo products in more than 50 different countries. My doubts were intensified when the brands hired outside, self-proclaimed neutral monitoring outfits, which they paid to do the monitoring. Although that appeared to ensure more thorough and objective monitoring, I was and continue to be puzzled over how such a monitoring organization, dependent on the brand for its work and its funding could reasonably be expected to critically report back to its “employer” that the latter was in violation of ILO conventions 87 and 98 by failing to allow the employees of the factories it used, to exercise their right of freedom of association or their right to engage in collective bargaining. In China, where so many subcontracting factories make so much of what we consume, and where there is only one legal government controlled and employer funded labor union, the All Chinese Federation of Trade Unions, it is difficult to see how so many brands can be given plaudits for their upholding the Core ILO conventions while worker exploitation continues and rank and file workers are jailed for protesting unfair conditions.
This evolution of scrutiny of overseas working conditions is quite relevant to where we presently find the Bangladeshi garment industry. Brands continue to farm out their work to local factories throughout the developing world, and primarily in southeast Asia. The brands set fixed prices for the local factories to manufacture and deliver their finished garments, the factories are able to enhance their profit most easily by cutting into the entitled earnings
of their workers by failing to pay them on time, by imposing mandatory overtime at straight time wage rates, by restricting their time for toilet breaks and healthcare necessities, and yes, by putting too many workers into factory buildings that can not bear the weight, or by renting factory buildings the owners of which shave costs by shoddy construction and by evading building and safety code requirements for exits and stairways. One would think that local governments would police these factories to assure compliance with national law. Too often the laws are weak and the government officials so underpaid that bribes and corruption are more often the rule than the exception.
Unfortunately there is no international law that mandates fair workplace conditions. The International Labor Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations, has since 1919 proclaimed as international norms a series of Conventions to which worker, employer and government groups from its member states have agreed to be fair, such as a work week of 40 hours with overtime paid for hours worked above that nor. When national governments ratify those Conventions, they become national law and many of the Southeast Asian countries have ratified most protective conventions. But not all national governments exercise the same measure of diligence in policing factories for violations and furthermore in many countries where violations are found, the integrity of the players does not prevent bribes and favors to protect the violating factory owners as they continue without apology their exploitative practices
The focus of consumer and NGO protest over these exploitative conditions has been on those developing countries where the media report the most newsworthy awful conditions; the mass tragedies at coal mines, in baby formula milk and living and working in toxic neighborhoods and factories and the suicides at Foxconn in China have all captured consumer attention, and raised red flags at the brands which are fearful of the adverse impact such reports have on their sales.
In China at least, these worker protests although occurring without the approval of the ACFTU, have led to substantial increases in wages and the factories owners there, Chinese, Taiwanese and Korean, look elsewhere for places where they can continue to produce for the brands with less scrutiny, with less governmental pressure and with assurances of slightly greater profit than they can earn in countries where workplace conditions are under ongoing scrutiny.
Increasingly those factory owners have migrated to Bangladesh. With the lowest wages in South East Asia the prospects for profit from factories were indeed greater than in those neighboring countries where monitoring was more effective, government scrutiny of building safety stronger, and where wages had begun to climb.
The enhanced profits that were attainable in Bangladesh proceeded largely under the do-gooders radar until the fires, and building collapse and the sudden glare of media scrutiny placed the Bangladesh garment industry under the microscope, and from my perspective spread concern from the narrow issue of factory safety to the broader issue of awareness of the deplorable working conditions of garment factory workers, and in turn, I guess, became the driving force for the Saturday seminar.
There were at that crowded session, open and frank expressions from the wide gamut of players in the current scene. Many of the declarations in the fast moving exchanges were self-serving. Brands and others management types shifted responsibility elsewhere for conditions that prudent investment and management required their knowledge of. Others proclaimed that the rapid rise of wages over the past few years has exacted too heavy a toll on the factory owners to justify their paying any more for the present while the international agency and NGO representatives proclaimed these events were essential as a wake up call to the business community to pick up more of the burden, indeed to picking up their fair share to enhance the living conditions of Bangladeshi workers to ensure the long term prosperity of the country.
I too, see this as a wake up call, but one that will improve conditions and contribute to prosperity for a larger community, the workers in factories in Bangladesh and among its neighbors.
Those ILO Conventions are not merely government hand-outs making their sponsors and agreeing governments feel relieved that they are meaningful partners in the international labor community. They are protections for those workplace partners who haven’t the clout to demand and achieve them on their own. When, perchance workers try to do so, through efforts to create unions or strike for better pay or to seek employer conformity with contribution requirements to government pension schemes, they are fired, they are arrested and they are penalized for trying to achieve what the world body, the ILO has held out as world wide norms. Not the best in the world, but indeed the minima that even governments and employer groups agree is the worker entitlement. Conformity to those norms cost employers money and squeeze the profit margins of the factories which know that a demand to the brands for higher payments will mean the loss of that and other orders to other countries. Those countries have factory owners who don’t feel such pressure from government and worker groups and can thus make acceptable profits under unwavering prices paid by the brands. It is indeed difficult, if not unreasonable for NGOs and others to expect the factory owners to voluntarily match ILO standards, or even national legal requirements if the cost of such compliance will drive them from business and eradicate the jobs of those they employed. It is also a fools errand to expect the brands to insist on factory compliance with national laws when it is clear that they can readily move their orders to factories in a neighboring country where the brand can continue to proclaim the importance of adherence to its code of conduct when it knows its hired gun monitor, or its self monitoring or even a gift to a overly curious government inspector, will exonerate it from any wrongdoing within the factory making its garments.
Until the Rana Plaza collapse, Bangladesh was in many cases the beneficiary of efforts elsewhere at code compliance and ILO convention adherence. The brands readily moved their orders to factories in Bangladesh where wages were lower than elsewhere in Southeast Asia, and where there was much less risk of government officials and very low paid labor officers coming after them as is the case in less corrupt countries. Given that background it was natural that the participants at the Harvard Seminar would try either to keep the clock from advancing by pointing out how much wages had risen in recent years while trying to protect status quo on worker protections. Despite the horrors of the fire that were so directly traceable to under code construction and disregard for safety of garment workers, many of those who found themselves pressured into paying restitution turned to the least objectionable and least costly program to get the whole mess behind them. The American companies, which were the supporters of the Alliance, unlike the mostly European companies endorsing the Accord, even sought to limit their liability through a fixed sum maximum total liability.
I viewed the conference as an exciting opportunity to meet and hear those who truly are the movers and shakers in the garment industry in Bangladesh, and if not Bangladesh based, are from the even more powerful institutions that seek to shape a positive future for Bangladesh in this most crucial area. How to do this?
In my view the brands do exercise a positive role in pressuring the factories to improve safety and workplace conditions to meet ILO and national statutory standards. Prior to Bangladesh coming under international scrutiny the brands have had the assurance of being able to move their orders to a lower cost countries such as Bangladesh, when there has been less blowback from disgruntled factory owners who bristle at accepting what the brands offer to pay. The factory mangers act have acted reasonably in their self-interest by trying to maximize their profit, even if off the backs of their employees when the brands routinely reject their pleas for higher payment. The workers of course, when they seek to assert their self interest in asking for more, even when it means having the factory live up to its statutory requirements, routinely expect to be suppressed, if not punished for seeking to speak up and are stuck as the dubious beneficiaries of continued work at factories opting to continue in business rather than pulling up stakes from their leased equipment to move themselves to neighboring countries with less commitment to providing fair workplace condition. The bottom line is that the country of Bangladesh and its factory owners benefit from brands moving their orders to its factories. It could be argued that the workers too benefit from the fact that they at least have jobs which they would not, had the brands continued to send their orders to factories in other countries. This downward spiral might well continue as brands seek ever-lower paying countries to which to move their orders. Beyond South East Asia, it seems feasible that they could move orders to Africa and elsewhere where wages are low, governments are cooperative and factory owners are present or are quick to arrive. But geography argues for that work remaining in South East Asia where all the competing countries border the water over which all of this merchandise is shipped by freighter. Thus it could be argued, that Bangladesh is indeed the last stop for the bargain hunting brands.
My position is clear, as I noted at the seminar. Workers have a reasonable expectation in seeking to work under conditions the world has in effect promulgated in the ILO conventions particularly the Fundamental Eight to protect against forced and child labor, to assurance of work in an equitable and non discriminatory workplace and to be free to exercise their right to organize and to bargain collectively. Factory owners have a right to maximize their profits but not by exploiting their workers or violating local protective laws. Brands have a right to achieve the highest profit in contracting garment production to local factories, but they too have a moral obligation, or good business sense to assure that the garments they sell are made under reasonable fair labor standards such as delineated by the ILO conventions. Regardless of whether their hired monitors announce their violation of laws or norms or code declarations, it is their responsibility to assure that the factories making their garments do so under fair conditions free of worker exploitation.
So is there a way out of this profit-chasing circle? I think there is and I further think that Bangladesh is the lynch pin that can bring an end to the bottom feeding shopping the brands practice. If the government of Bangladesh were to take the position that it expects factory owners within the country to adhere to ILO standards and joined in prohibiting workplace exploitation I believe that would bring an effective end to the brands threatening to take work from factories in one country to move them to a factory elsewhere where the factory owner can get away with the worker exploitation. If all factories in Southeast Asian countries were to take the same position that they are complying with Code requirements by paying more in wages, in worker benefits and protections, it might indeed force the brands to pay the factory managers more when there is no lesser paying country to which it could move its orders.
What, you ask, is that fair standard to which factory managers and owners can be expected to operate; what is that level playing field? What has happened in Cambodia provides the promising answer. In 2002 the Cambodian government under the multi-fiber agreement, as a condition of securing a larger import quota into the US, agreed to having the ILO come into the country to monitor its garment factories. Instead of its factories having to spruce up for periodic inspections from every one of the brands for which it was producing garments (often a dozen or more), the ILO undertook the monitoring function, periodically making unannounced visits asking 500 questions of factories and their employees to assure workplace fairness. The government agreed to allow workers to organize and engage in collective bargaining, and to the creation of the Arbitration Council, an independent body of local lawyers selected by the parties serving as arbitrators to resolve questions of violation of collective agreements or law. It was expected that on December 31, 2004, the expiration date of the multi-fibre agreement, that the 250 factories employing some 250,000 garment workers would close. They didn’t. Instead they expanded. Today there are some 350 factories employing some 700,000 employees, and factories from other countries including China with its higher wages are moving to Cambodia subjecting themselves to ILO inspections and oversight as preferable to the conditions under which they operated before where cronyism and corruption often permitted greater profits and a continued supply of work orders from the brands. It has not all been clear sailing. Cambodia has had its problems, there has been a rash of now-legal strikes and conflict among trade unions and regional associations competing to represent workers. But structures are in place to help cope with them.
If all the Southeast Asian countries banded together to provide employment in compliance with ILO standards or under enforced national laws their factories would have a stronger defense against the country shopping engaged in by the brands. The brands would have to reconsider the strictness of their pricing in letting out contracts to the factories even though that might result in raising their prices. But since all their competitors would be making their garments in the same factories under the same constraints, that competitive disadvantage would be dissipated. And the evidence shows that consumers in Europe and the US are willing to pay somewhat more for garments made under fair working conditions.
I offer no guarantees that this proposal will fully resolve the problem of workplace fairness, will prevent the race to the bottom, or will even ensure that Bangladesh will retain and expand its garment trade. But I offer it as a measure for improving workplace safety and enhancing worker rights in Bangladesh now, which all at the conference claimed to be their unanimous goal. It would also provide assurance of a safer base line in the competition among countries elsewhere in Southeast Asia shifting competition to improved workplace competitive efficiency instead of that competition being based on who pays the lowest wages and who bribes the government officials the most to effectively to avoid enforcement of safety and workplace standards.
Those at the conference all professed unwavering dedication to the lot of the Bangladeshi workers. This might be a good place to start.
by Admin | Jul 6, 2014 | Highlights
Change your perspective: A worker cleans the windows of a building in Beijing’s central business district, April 4, 2007. (Reinhard Krause / Courtesy Reuters)
By Kurt M. Campbell and Ely Ratner, published on Foreign Affairs
The United States is in the early stages of a substantial national project: reorienting its foreign policy to commit greater attention and resources to the Asia-Pacific region. This reformulation of U.S. priorities has emerged during a period of much-needed strategic reassessment, after more than a decade of intense engagement with South Asia and the Middle East. It is premised on the idea that the history of the twenty-first century will be written largely in the Asia-Pacific, a region that welcomes U.S. leadership and rewards U.S. engagement with a positive return on political, economic, and military investments.
As a result, the Obama administration is orchestrating a comprehensive set of diplomatic, economic, and security initiatives now known as the “pivot,” or “rebalancing,” to Asia. The policy builds on more than a century of U.S. involvement in the region, including important steps taken by the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations; as President Barack Obama has rightly noted, the United States is in reality and rhetoric already a “Pacific power.” But the rebalancing does represent a significant elevation of Asia’s place in U.S. foreign policy.
Continue reading on Foreign Affairs.
by Admin | Jul 3, 2014 | Highlights
(BGF) – Kosaku Dairokuno, Professor of Comparative Politics from Meiji University, Tokyo shared his thoughts about Building a Framework for Peace and Security in the Pacific during the BGF’s online conference of July 2, 2014. He expected the U.S to be an active member in the Convention on the Law of the Sea, and a “Framework for Peace and Security” needs to be built in various regional get-togethers such as the East Asia Summit, APEC, ASEAN plus Three, etc.
In dealing with the conflicts in the South China Sea, he also expressed the need to get China to understand that “it will be in its own interest to pursue the common interest among the neighboring nations” and to get China involved in the talk of peace and security in the Pacific.
Building the Framework: Professor Kosaku Dairokuno on Peace and Security in the Pacific
July 2, 2014 | By Kosaku Dairokuno, Professor of Comparative Politics, Meiji University, Tokyo
Under the UNCLOS framework, when two or more countries have disagreements regarding their legitimate territories, EEZ, or the mid-line between them, countries concerned ought to resolve the differences through negotiations. If they cannot settle the disagreements, either one of the parties can take this to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea or to the International Court of Justice for judgment only if the other parties agree to do so.
But, such agreement is not usually so easy; the country that desires the third party judgment will ask for arbitration instead, because the arbitration process does not require a prior agreement between the parties to bring the disagreements to the Court. In this case, however, any decision by the court is not necessarily respected by the party which has not agreed to bring the issue to the court.
This is likely the case for the Philippines asking to the International Tribunal for Law of the Sea for arbitration between China over the disputed territory in the South China Sea. China seems not to be interested in responding to this arbitration process, and is not likely to provide its case to the Tribunal. In this case, the Tribunal may come to a conclusion probably in favor of Philippines. But, politically speaking, this decision actually cannot resolve the conflict between the two nations. The Tribunal’s decisions are not enough, although not morally ineffective, when the issue is concerned with the claim over territories.
Therefore, we have to find some kind of multinational framework for conflict resolution that is much stronger than the Code of Conduct currently implemented among the nations surrounding the disputed areas in the South China Sea. I would like to see the US ratify the Convention on the Law of the Sea, and become an active member of the treaty, which has long been overdue. And, it may be good idea to have a “framework for peace and security” in various regional get-togethers such as the East Asia Summit, APEC, ASEAN plus Three, etc.
We need to get China to understand that it will be in its own interest to pursue the common interest among the neighboring nations, since their economies have become closely inter-dependent with each other. Therefore, it is not a good idea to take too much assertive action that makes other nations baffled about the real intention of the country. In the short term, we have to set up as many opportunities as possible to talk about peace and security in the Pacific, with China. At the same time, we have to build mutual trust by encouraging the exchange of students, scholars, and business men; as well as open discussion about the common future, although it surely will take a long time. The closer relationships we build between the peoples, the more difficult it will be for any country to be engaged in openly assertive actions. In fact, there are many other economic, environmental, and political issues and problems we have to tackle together in order to keep forwarding prosperity in this region.
